Feluda the sleuth

Feluda is a fictional character starring in a series of novels and short stories written by the famous Indian film director and writer Satyajit Ray. He is a private detective living at Rajani Sen Road, Ballygunj, Kolkata. Feluda first made his appearance in a Bengali children’s magazine called “Sandesh” in 1965.

Feluda was always accompanied by his cousin Topshe and in later stories by a popular thriller writer Jatayu (Lalmohan Ganguly).

Feluda’s real name is Pradosh Chandra Mitter (although Feluda prefers to spell his name as ‘Pradosh C. Mitter’), His nickname is “Felu”, the suffix “da” being short for “dada” or “elder brother” in the Bengali language.

He is around 27 year old with a tall, athletic figure with enormous physical strength. However, he uses his physical power only when it becomes absolutely necessary. He usually uses his brain to solve problems instead of muscle power and sophisticated instruments. Feluda likes to smoke cigarettes and chew betel leaves. Charminar is his favourite brand. He gets up early in the morning and stars his day with yogasana. He is also a connoisseur of delicious foods, popular movies and books. He is also a voracious reader with a varied range of topics. His general knowledge is of excellent quality.

“Our aim is to introduce the new generation to the genius of Satyajit Ray by bringing his stories of Feluda, the professional detective with a super-sharp brain, in comic book form,” said Subhadra Sengupta at the launch of “Murder by the Sea” at Eureka Book Store in DLF Mall, Saket, the other day. The comic book is targeted at children in the age group of nine years and above and is the third in the series that has been launched by Penguin in the last few months, with two more in the pipeline.

The launch was attended by a group of enthusiastic children with their parents in tow, out for a fun-filled Sunday afternoon. To make the occasion interesting, an interactive session was introduced where children were given a series of illustrations with blank boxes. They were asked to interpret the dialogues and “make their own comic”

Their work was evaluated by Tapas Guha, who has done artwork for the comic book. Said Guha, “Ray had already illustrated the character of Feluda and other prominent characters in the series, like his cousin Topshe and friend Lalmohan Ganguli; I kept these illustrations in mind while giving it final shape.”

Sengupta, who has scripted the comic series from the original in Bengali, is enthused by the response. She said, “Satyajit Ray’s adventures of Feluda have been avidly read by children for years. Now this sleuth with a razor-sharp brain appears in an exciting new comic book series.”

She also read sections of the book on the occasion, as children listened with rapt attention about the escapades of Feluda, Topshe and Lalmohan Babu, who, while on a holiday in Puri, discover a body on the beach. Here on, the holiday turns into an edge-of-the-seat hunt for the killer, a murderer with many faces who will not hesitate to kill again.

Sengupta was full of optimism about the comic book series providing a platform for young children to move on to other works by the master, Satyajit Ray, including his novels, poems and music.

A mysterious incident in Nepal. A dead body on the beaches of Puri. A murder in an abandoned house…

The search for a valuable scroll leads Feluda and his friends to a strange case of characters, and perhaps the most chilling case Feluda has ever been faced with. For among D.G.Sen, the collector of scrolls, his son Mahim, his secretary Nishit, the wildlife photographer Bilas Majumdar and the astrologer Laxman Bhattacharya, there is a cold-blooded criminal, and he must be stopped before it is too late…

Bakso Rahashya is a Bengali novel by Satyajit Ray featuring the private detective Feluda. Also known as Mystery of Kalka Mail

Plot summary

Feluda is approached by an established businessman who claims to have mistakenly swapped his suitcase (bakso) in a train with one belonging to one of his co-passengers and now wants Feluda to put it straight. This simple looking problem lands Feluda, Topshe and Lalmohan babu in Shimla, and into a realm of deceit and mystery involving a long forgotten diamond and a priceless manuscript about A Bengalee in LamalandBesides ‘THE THREE MUSKTEERS’ we have Dinanath Lahiri…the rich kindhearted businessman,his nephew,Prabeer Lahiri who is a striving actor but too much obsessed with his only weakness,his voice. the rest three characters in this story are the ones who were with Dinanath Lahiri in his 1st class compartment,Mr.Pakrashi,Mr. Brijmohan,&Mr.Dhameeja whogot his attache exchanged with Mr. Lahiri. So our THREE MUSKTEERS fly off to shimla to get back the attache meanwhile they make a mindblowing discovery.

The film is based on the famous Feluda novel of the same name by Satyajit Ray himself.

Story

Feluda played by Soumitra, the sharp and witty detective from Calcutta, his cousin Topshe and friend Lalmohan Ganguly played by Santosh Dutta visits Benaras (Varanasi), a town on the banks of Ganges. In Benaras they meet a Bengali family. On coming to know that Feluda is a famous detective the head of this family invites him to his place and tells him about theft of an idol of Ganesha, the elephant God.

This idol is made of pure gold and is a prized possession of the family and is supposed to bring good luck to the family. “Maganlal Meghraj” (enacted by Utpal Dutt) a wealthy businessman from Benaras has had his eyes set on the idol. Feluda promises to help the family in finding the idol. Meanwhile, the sculptor who was sculpting the Durga idol for the Durga Puja festival is murdered and the mystery deepens. Feluda uses his brilliant detective skills to unravel the mystery and bring the culprits to the book.

The story has two sub plots. On the one hand, it is the story of the acquisitive instinct of a greed Marwari businessman, who would spare no expenses to get what he desires, even at the cost of murdering some innocents and bribing the willing. On the other, it is also the tale of cautionary foresight exercised by the family head. The sights and sounds and the brilliant cinematography and photographic imagery takes the nostalgic viewer to a lost world of the innocence, the beauty and the freshness of a north Indian town, that is at once, far from the madding corruptibility of big cities. Subaltern texts like the caste and the communal divide do make their presence felt, but they exist as subplots, that further enrich the viewer’s understanding.

As feluda was doing yogasana everyday in the morning, I would like to post some of the basic yogasana here. And if possible how to do that.

By doing the yogasana, he was able to make his body fit.

Let’s find what is yogasana?

Asana (Sanskrit आसन sitting down < आस to sit down) is a body position, typically associated with the practice of Yoga, intended primarily to restore and maintain a practitioner’s well-being, improve the body’s flexibility and vitality, and promote the ability to remain in seated meditation for extended periods. These are widely known as Yoga postures or Yoga positions, which is currently practiced for exercise and as alternate medicine.

In the context of Yoga practice, asana refers to two things: the place where a practitioner (yogin (general usage); yogi (male); yogini (female)) sits and the manner (posture) in which s/he sits. In the Yoga sutras, Patanjali suggests that asana is “to be seated in a position that is firm, but relaxed”. As the repertoire of postures has expanded and moved beyond the simple sitting posture over the centuries, modern usage has come to include variations from lying on the back and standing on the head, to a variety of other positions. In the Yoga sutras, Patanjali mentions the execution of an asana as the third of the eight limbs of Classical or Raja yoga.

The word asana in Sanskrit does appear in many contexts denoting a static physical position, although, as noted, traditional usage is specific to the practice of yoga. Traditional usage defines asana as both singular and plural. In English, plural for asana is defined as asanas. In addition, English usage within the context of yoga practice sometimes specifies yogasana or yoga asana, particularly with regard to the system of the Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga. That said, yogasana is also the name of a particular posture that is not specifically associated with the Vinyasa system, and that while “ashtanga” (small ‘a’) refers to the eight limbs of Yoga delineated below, Ashtanga (capital ‘A’) refers to the specific system of Yoga developed by Sri Krishnamacharya at the Mysore Palace.

We know that Holmes would have been nowhere without Dr John Hamish Watson. Similarly, can you imagine of Hercule Poirot without Captain Arthur Hastings or Byomkesh Bakshi without Ajit? Their supportive roles have made these detectives complete. These assistant-cum-companions act as the surrogate audience for us, the readers. But, they all are part of male bastion. What harm it would have been had our Pradosh Chandra Mitra aka Feluda met a nice charming lady, not as a soulmate, but as an able assistant and narrator of the stories? Female mystery busters in fiction were few and far between then and the tradition continues. What is stopping the thriller writers? Concern for womanly primness? But, that wasn’t always a female monopoly. Holmes was chaotic in his ways but like Poirot, the Baker Street resident was moderately fashionable, if we consider his attire. Is it then that the world of detectives is not ready to accept women as equals? A lady boss called M here, a Jessica Fletcher and few gun-totting lady cops there doesn’t really make much difference. A hot lady like Beyonce Knowles as the detective, larger than her ‘If I were a Boy’ dreams, will be a super hit. When will the writers realise that? Why should only James Bond have all the fun?

With fashion comes the physique. The writers have been successful in making us believe that detection and the hot pursuit cannot be done by someone like, say, short-plump Danny de Vito. Through the ages, protagonists of the thrillers and mystery stories have been ‘tough men with sleek ways.’ Whether it is Ethan Hunt of the Mission Impossible series or Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan — writers have depended on the agile and well-shaped heroes to maintain the pace and inspire awe among the readers. There have been few exceptions though, like Agatha Christies’ portly Poirot or Sherlock Holmes’s rather lazy and armchair-loving elder brother Mycroft, or in recent times writer Jeffery Deaver’s preference to mind’s power in his story The Bone Collector where a quadripeligic and bed-ridden ex-cop Lincoln Rhyme solves the mystery of a serial murder in New York.

The animation biggie has also bagged exclusive rights to make a three part TV feature on Satyajit Ray’s Feluda detective series. He wrote 35 Feluda stories which were first published in Bengali children’s magazine in 1965.

The first and the second part of the CGI series are under pre-production. “Depending on its success, we will make a feature film. This is a prime property and we are in a revenue-sharing model with the family. The first of the series will be launched this year. About 4-5 suitors have approached us for distribution rights. But we are yet to take a call on it,” added Chakravarti. Also in the pipeline is the animated series of Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book.

What does sleuth means? That is the common question come across whenever one mentions the Feluda the sleuth…. Well after lot of question on the same, I am including this as a new category!!! Thanks for asking in this regard, this makes my blog enriched by one more category…

Tracking down the history of the word sleuth requires a bit of etymological sleuthing. The immediate ancestor of our word is the compound sleuthhound, “a dog, such as a bloodhound, used for tracking or pursuing.” This term took on a figurative sense, “tracker, pursuer,” which is closely related to the sense “detective.” From sleuthhound came the shortened form sleuth, recorded in the sense “detective” as early as 1872. The first part of the term sleuthhound means “track, path, trail,” and is first recorded in a Middle English work written probably around 1200. The Middle English word, which had the form sloth, with eu representing the Scots development of the Middle English (ō), was a borrowing of the Old Norse word slōdh, “a track or trail.”

If we see the Thesaurus for Sleuth then, It is a person whose work is investigating crimes or obtaining hidden evidence or information: detective, investigator. Informal eye. Slang dick, gumshoe.

Also, find certain Theatre, film and other places where SLEUTH has been used….

Theatre and film

* Sleuth (play) a 1970 play by Anthony Shaffer
* Sleuth (1972 film), a film adaptation of the Anthony Shaffer play, directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz
* Sleuth (2007 film), a film adaptation of the Anthony Shaffer play, adapted by Harold Pinter and directed by Kenneth Branagh
* The Sleuth (1925 film), a silent era film featuring Stan Laurel